Sermon and Worship Resources

Showing 51 to 75 of 165 results

Luke 4:14-30

Sermon

Will Willimon

“And he began to say to them, 'Today this scripture has been fulfilled in your hearing.”' Luke 4:21 I would wager that this text, Luke 4:14-30, has been preached more than any other here in Duke Chapel. If you're a regular worshipper here, you have heard it used as a text for sermons at least three times in the past two years. Its proper place is here, on the third Sunday after Epiphany. But it's ...

52. Holy Extravagance

Mark 14:3-9

Sermon

Will Willimon

The preacher steps from the pulpit, the ancient book is closed, the choir has finished, the benediction is given, the Threefold Amen is sung and the notes die away from the organ. Now, 1eft with your thoughts, it was good, you think to yourself, all well and good -- the preacher was adequate, the prayers, the choir quite good, the organ fine. But a nagging question keeps tugging at your brain. You...

53. Homecoming

Hosea 14:1-3a

Sermon

Will Willimon

When my mother died, for the longest time thereafter, I had a dream. Same dream almost every night. In my dream, I was home, in the house where I grew up, the same house which my mother had designed and had built. My dreams were memorable, even startling for me, for I hardly ever dream, or if I do, I can never remember my dreams. But in these dreams of home, everything was so vivid, so particular...

54. Homecoming

Exodus 17:1-7

Sermon

Will Willimon

Our scripture is about a people on a journey, far from home. And if you know anything all about the Bible, this is the way it always begins-somebody being told to leave wherever they happen to be at the moment and to journey somewhere else. Adam and Eve were told to get out of the Garden, Abraham told to take his bride and baggage to he knows not where, Jacob on the lam, and Israel taking forty ye...

55. Homecoming

Mark 16:1-20

Sermon

Will Willimon

I want to speak to those of you who are grieving the death of someone whom you love, which, by my reckoning, includes about everyone here. For some of you, your pain is still acute. Others, like me, found that the ache of the loss gradually receded. You got up, you went on, but still, at moments when you least expect, grief grips you again and you realize there are not many days in this life witho...

56. House of God

1 Kings 8:22-30

Sermon

Will Willimon

"Will God indeed dwell on the earth? Behold, heaven, and the highest heaven cannot contain thee, how much less this house which I have built." Fifty-one years ago tomorrow, Duke Chapel was dedicated in a great service of worship. Speakers hailed this Chapel as a splendid symbol of faith. President B.R. Lacy of Union Seminary in Richmond was the first to speak at the Sunday afternoon service on Ju...

People are hungry to give their lives to something more important than themselves. It is a fact of life, not only that everything costs us something, but that, in our better moments, we are even eager to pay the cost.

Will Willimon

58. I Want You All to Get A’s

Matthew 20:1-16

Illustration

Will Willimon

The Parable of the Workers in the Vineyard that cries out against our sense of judgment. We cannot help but puzzle and protest over the actions of the landowner. We cannot avoid the conclusion that this story is just not fair. William Willimon gives the story a modern twist: First day of class the professor says, "Now class, this is a course in advanced mathematics. Your entire grade will be bas...

59. Imagination

Luke 1:39-45, 46-55

Sermon

Will Willimon

Peter Gomes, Minister of memorial Church at Harvard, recently spoke of the Bible as "A book of the imagination" (The Good Book). Don't think of scripture primarily as rules, as lists of regulations. Think of the Bible as a book meant to speak, to stoke, to fuel the imagination. From what I see, imagination is in short supply these days. We modem folk tend toward mostly facts and figures. We're mo...

60. Imagine

Revelation 21:10, 22-26

Sermon

Will Willimon

''And I saw no temple in the city, for its temple is the Lord God the Almighty and the Lamb. And the city has no need of sun or moon to shine upon it, for the glory of God is its light…” Today's lesson speaks of the New Jerusalem, the Heavenly City. ''Then I saw a new heaven and a new earth; for the first...had passed away'' (Rev. 21:1). When God gets finished with Durham, there will be no sun or...

61. Immediately, They Followed

Mark 1:14-20

Sermon

Will Willimon

"And Jesus said to them, 'Follow me and I will make you become fishers of men.' And immediately they left their nets and ·followed him." This is the sort of text which preachers love, this snippet of a story about the calling of Simon, Andrew, James and John, from the first chapter of Mark. "And passing along by the Sea of Galilee, he saw Simon and Andrew…casting a net in the sea; for they were ...

62. Is This All There Is?

Revelation 21:1-6

Sermon

Will Willimon

“Behold, the dwelling of God is with men. He will dwell with them, and they shall be his people.” Last week I came to the office early, disposed of some correspondence, returned a few telephone calls, and had time on my hands by ten thirty. The students were in exams so it was unusually quiet around here. I decided to escape, to take the rest of the afternoon off. The warm April sun shone through ...

63. Is This Any Way for a King to Behave?

2 Samuel 7:1-11, 16 · Luke 1:26-38

Sermon

Will Willimon

King David is in a magnanimous mood. In today's first lesson, King David offers to build God a huge, marvelous temple in which to live. Is King David embarrassed? He has such a fine house of cedar, but the Almighty God of Israel has had for years to content himself with mere tents and mobile tabernacles. Is that any way for a King to treat his divine benefactor? So King David announces a royal bui...

64. Jesus at the Center of the Storm

Mark 4:35-41

Illustration

Will Willimon

The disciples' question is ours: Do you not care that we perish? Jesus doesn't care about the storm. But does he care about us who care about the storm? About this time of the year, I invariably think of a divinity student whom I taught. He felt called by God to serve as pastor to rural churches. Amazingly, he found a woman who felt called by God to marry him and go with him into a lifetime of s...

65. Jesus' Final Exam

Luke 20:19-40

Sermon

Will Willimon

Have any of you visiting alumni ever had a dream in which you dreamed that you were back here in school at Duke during an exam? It's a fairly typical alumni dream. The dream often involves some problem you have with the exam. You have studied all night for the final in organic chemistry. But now, on the morning of the exam, you find that the classroom door is locked by Dr. Wilder. You pound on the...

66. Jesus' Temptation

Luke 4:1-13

Sermon

Will Willimon

As a young man, Jesus was led into the wilderness. There, the devil met him and tempted him. It is a tradition in the church to begin the forty days of Lent with Jesus' forty days of testing in the wilderness. It is fitting that we recall this story in a university chapel because (don't you agree?) it is at the beginning of your life, when one is a young adult, that one is most preoccupied with, "...

67. Jesus' Vacation

Matthew 11:25-30

Sermon

Will Willimon

I know that many of you are here on vacation. I admire you for your faithfulness. Even though you are on vacation, you have come to church. Vacations are wonderful opportunities to, as we say, "get away from it all." A period of time, set aside from life's daily difficulties, when we unburden. Where there are usually alarm clocks, there is sleeping in until ten. Where there were bran flakes at bre...

68. Jews and Christians: All in the Family

Romans 15:4-13

Sermon

Will Willimon

“May the God of steadfastness and encouragement grant you to live in such harmony with one another, in accord with Christ Jesus, that together you may with one voice glorify the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ. Welcome one another...as Christ has welcomed you, for the glory of God.” Any law enforcement officer will tell you that a policeman would rather try to stop a bank robbery than to i...

69. Joy

Luke 2:1-11 · Isaiah 9:2-6

Sermon

Will Willimon

"I bring you good news of great joy for all people: to you is born this day...a Savior,..." Church doesn't get much more joyful than this; Christmas Day, and on a Sunday. All of today's scriptures speak of joy, as well as the hymns. "Joy To the World." Joy can be a challenge in church. On most Sundays, church tends to overdo the imperative, filling the air with "should," "ought," and "must." Do ...

70. Justice

Matthew 18:21-35

Sermon

Will Willimon

The story begins with mathematics. Peter asks Jesus, "Lord, how often should I forgive my brother or sister who sins against me?" Seven times? That sounds reasonable, even mathematically merciful. Jesus responds with a geometrically progressive figure. Forgiveness is limitless. It cannot be tallied. Throw away calculator and slide rule. Stop counting. There are no mathematicians or accountants in ...

71. Knowledge

Genesis 3:1-19 · Psalm 90

Sermon

Will Willimon

It's a story, primitive story, primordial, which means basic, deep; a true story. It's from Genesis, the beginning book of the Bible, beginning of humanity. Genesis means "in the beginning." In the beginning, God made man and woman and put them in the garden. God will keep the good garden. All man and woman must do is to enjoy, to "be fruitful and multiply" -- which sounds enjoyable. It's a story...

72. Lazarus, Arise!

John 11:1-44

Sermon

Will Willimon

We're in Lent, the season of the cross, moving steadily, somberly, week by week, toward the inevitable death of Jesus. You know how the story ends. Which makes it a bit surprising that here, on the fifth Sunday of Lent, the church should place this story, the raising of Lazarus. Shouldn't we wait until after Easter for this one, sometime after the resurrection? Not here in Lent, the season of deat...

73. Let's Get Together

Acts 2:1-21 · Genesis 11:1-11

Sermon

Will Willimon

A few days after we bombed Libya, a letter to the Durham Morning Herald urged citizens to unite behind our President. ''This is no time for criticism,'' she said. ''This is a time to unite against those who are evil.'' The letter was unnecessary, for we were already solidly united behind our leader. War does that to people. Even as we Americans were uniting behind our President, dissident Libyans...

74. Light in the Darkness

John 1:1-18

Sermon

Will Willimon

“In him was life, and the light was the light of men. The light shines in the darkness, and the darkness has not overcome it.” (John 1:4,5) Even as we gather on this night in this peaceful, beautiful Chapel, there is a certain tension, isn't there? It is the tension within tonight's gospel: Tension between darkness and light. The child at Bethlehem brought light, but he was light into the darkness...

75. Living Sacrifice

Romans 12:1-8

Sermon

Will Willimon

I had this man in my last church who frequently greeted me at the end of the service by thrusting into my hand some newspaper article, usually from the Wall Street Journal, which he thought to be of help in his never-ending battle to educate his preacher. One Sunday, he gave me an article by a national columnist, in which the columnist described how a young woman had been indicted in Chicago afte...

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